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Adrezs
Contributor
Contributor

Lenovo ST250 ESXi VM Disappearing when host reboots

I also logged a message on the Lenovo Forums and have not had any response or suggestions, surely I cannot be the only person in the world with this problem?

The machine has had the latest firmware applied to the devices.

Configuration (NEW) Server

Lenovo ThinkSystem ST250 Standalone ESXi 6.7U3 Host, (free license) single VM, Small Customer Second Site.

I have the Lenovo 32GB M.2 SSD as the Boot Drive for ESXi on the standard SATA Onboard Controller

I have 2 X 900GB SATA SSD on Thinksystem RAID 930-8i (RAID1)

The VM is a MS Windows Server 2019 Std this phenomena was also happening on the 2016 Std VM I had on the same data store

Everytime the host restarts the VM disappears, I have to go into the DataStore Browser and register the VM and power up manually.

After the restart the Datastore is in tact, the datastore is there, however the VM disappears from the inventory

I also have a similar setup on which this DOES NOT Happen

Configuration (EXISTING) - I have restarted the Host many times and the VM starts up no problems

Lenovo ThinkSystem ST250 Standalone ESXi 6.7 Host, (free license) single VM, Small Customer Primary Site. (No Updates)

2 X 600GB SAS drives (RAID1) on Thinksystem RAID 930-8i as the Boot Drive for ESXi (different to problem host)

2 X 900GB SATA SSD on Thinksystem RAID 930-8i (RAID1) Same as other System

The VM is a MS Windows Server 2016 Std

The difference between the systems seems to be:

ESXi boot drive = 32GB SSD M.2 onboard SATA raid controller

ESXi 6.7U3 on this system, where the old sysem has ESXi 6.7

Someone please provide suggestions on the possible solution, as I can't handover to the customer in this state

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SupreetK
Commander
Commander

By any chance, do you have the SSD controller in pass-thru mode?

https://serverfault.com/questions/941551/esxi-6-5-unregistering-all-guest-vms-on-reboot

-Supreet

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Adrezs
Contributor
Contributor

Pardon my ignorance, I am not an expert in ESXi

Where do I check to see if the SSD controller is in passthrough mode & where can I change it to vmkernel ?

Please keep in mind that the other host is running the same controller same SSD datastore drives the only difference is

This host

has the ESXi boot on the onboard SATA controller with m2.ssd

The Datastore is on the SSD Raid controller

the other host with no problems

has the ESXi boot on 2 SAS drives RAID 1

has the Data store on 2 SSD drives RAID 1

BOTH on the SAME SSD controller

Thanks

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Adrezs
Contributor
Contributor

Hi Sorry

I checked on the host and the SSD RAID controller is not in passthrough mode - it is disabled

Screen Shot 2019-11-17 at 9.10.07 pm.png

Please provide any other suggestions

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